Craigslist bullies unofficial blog over domain, trademarks

The unofficial Craigslist blog is getting free advertising with a side of …

Not everyone is fond of the flaky characters who make or respond to posts on Craigslist, but the company itself has a fairly clean, people-friendly reputation. It's certainly not typically known for going on bullying sprees around the 'Net in an attempt to protect its own trademarks, ala Apple and the use of the word "pod" or, say, logos that also happen to contain representations of apples. But that reputation could be changing, as Craigslist recently issued legal threats against a blogger over trademark infringement.

Tim White started the Craigslist Blog (located at craigslistblog.org) in late February of this year. He published your average blog posts there, such as rants about craigslist rental listings, observations about Craigslist's revenue, and opinions about whether craigslist should ban its "erotic services" category. At the time, Craigslist (the company) did not yet have its own company blog, but that changed more than a month later when the company launched its own blog at blog.craigslist.org. This blog contained postings relating to official company announcements (such as new language support) and anecdotes about life at Craigslist's San Francisco office.

Although the two blogs appear to be pretty easily differentiated by their content, the names of the two were still strikingly similar. Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster thought so, anyway, which spurred him to send a strongly-worded takedown request to White this week. In the letter published on the (unofficial) Craigslist Blog, Buckmaster asks White to "stop using the infringing domain CRAIGSLISTBLOG.ORG immediately, and arrange for tranfer [sic] of it to us asap."

Not only that, but the name "Craigslist Blog" is also infringing, Buckmaster said, as well as the subhead "Best of Craigslist" and the reposting of excerpts from Craigslist ads. (If that last one is infringing, then I infringe regularly on my own blog when I quote funny/interesting/sad Craigslist posts I find from the city of Chicago.) The original letter reminds White that continuing to use an "infringing domain" can result in a penalty of up to $100,000.

Unofficial Craigslist Blog on the top, official one on the bottom

White wasn't one to back down. But first, he made a number of changes to his site in order to accommodate Craigslist, such as adding the word "unofficial" to his site's header and removing all quotes from Craigslist postings on the site. He challenged Craigslist's demand to hand over the domain, though, by asking whether Buckmaster was also pursuing a number of other Craigslist-themed domains. Buckmaster was not amused by this, and rather tersely e-mailed Craigslist's legal counsel with a mere carbon copy to White. "Unfortunately it sounds like Tim may prefer to go the legal route here," Buckmaster wrote to an attorney at Perkins Coie. "Unless you hear otherwise from him shortly, please proceed."

Although the unofficial Craigslist Blog may be walking a thin line with its domain name, the site could have some legal legs to stand on if the case were to escalate. During a somewhat similar case between Lowe's and the owner of Lowes-sucks.com, EFF staff attorney Corynne McSherry told Ars that trademark law is meant to protect consumers and provide them with accurate information about a company's product. She said that spinoff and complaint sites fall into that category, because they provide others with information about certain people's experiences or opinions. Since the unofficial Craigslist Blog doesn't claim to be Craigslist (or even the official company blog), merely using the name "Craigslist" in its domain isn't likely to substantiate a trademark infringement claim.

The company's PR team did not respond to our request for comment by publication time, despite us giving them several days, but Buckmaster has already posted an update on the official Craigslist blog about the situation and appears to have softened a hair on White. "Fwiw, we have no interest in shutting down blogs about Craigslist, critical or otherwise, and have never tried to do so. But in the strange world of trademarks and copyright, it's poor practice to allow a confusingly similar domain or business name to go unchallenged." he wrote. "But there was no need for me to act like a jerk, provoked or not."

Jacqui Cheng
Jacqui is an Editor at Large at Ars Technica, where she has spent the last eight years writing about Apple culture, gadgets, social networking, privacy, and more. Emailjacqui@arstechnica.com//Twitter@eJacqui